Modern cable modems provide internet access and voice services to customers over the cable television network. Cable modems permit the connection of consumer premises equipment (CPE) such as personal computers and voice over internet protocol (VOIP) handsets. This permits service providers to offer a wide variety of services through a single piece of hardware. Such cable modems offer a wide range of configuration options, particularly with respect to the configuration of a user's home computer network. Unfortunately, the user interfaces for such devices are unintuitive at best and pose a significant challenge for the average user. This problem is made worse by the arcane manner in which users must connect to the cable modem, frequently requiring the use of a wired Ethernet connection and a computer.
In most cases, a user must establish a physical connection to the cable modem and enter a default IP address that identifies the device. The average user has no idea what an IP address is, nor how to use one. Additionally, misconfiguration of the cable modem can render it practically impossible to use the standard method of configuration without manually resetting the modem and its settings.